May 1738

MAY 1738

May 1738 

Wesley's Warming Journey

By Brenda Rees © All Rights Reserved

May 1738    The month of John Wesley’s “warming” at Aldersgate has arrived.  In April he had struggled with the concepts of instantaneous work and conversion; and practiced extempore prayer. Peter Bohler continued to influence him.  John Wesley lived a long life, 1703-1791.  He is 35 in 1738.

If you are new to this blog, consider starting with the Introduction of Wesley’s Warming Journey Blog and then each month from February 1736.  Earliest months were grouped together, but Blog is now by month.  This blog carries you from Wesley’s landing at Tybee Island in 1736 eventually through his warming at Aldersgate back in London in 1738.  You might see signs that Wesley’s warming began in America, the Colony of Georgia and Spanish Florida.  © Brenda Rees | Shaping Florida

WesleysWarmingJourney.blogspot.com

THE JOURNAL – “PART THE SECOND”

From February 1, 1738 – August 12, 1738

An image of

Nettleton Court

, on the east side of

Aldersgate Street

.  From:   “The Homes, Haunts and Friends of John Wesley: Being The Centenary Number of ‘The Methodist Recorder’,” 1891, Revised and Enlarged with Illustrations; From the Lane Rees Collection  © Brenda Rees | Shaping Florida. 

                                                                                                                              

Monday, May 1, 1738 –  Charles Wesley is ill and John Wesley goes to London.  Wesley noted Charles was still “strongly averse from what he called ‘the new faith.’”  John Wesley wrote up a long list of rules for the “little society.”  The 11 rules were recommended by Peter Bohler according to Wesley’s Journal.  They included when to meet, how to speak, how to be admitted and how to be ejected.

Wednesday, May 3, 1738 – Wesley wrote in his Journal that Charles had long conversation with Peter Bohler and had seen “‘through grace, we are saved.’”

Thursday, May 4, 1738 –  Peter Bohler left London for Carolina.

Sunday, May 7, 1738 –  Wesley preached at two churches, but wrote in his Journal that he was informed not to preach at them anymore.

Tuesday, May 9, 1738 –  Wesley preached at Great St. Helen’s and said his heart was enlarged. He was told afterwards not to preach there again.

Saturday, May 13, 1738 –  Sorrowful, Wesley wrote he did not sing, read, meditate or pray for a few days.  A letter from Peter Bohler lifted his spirits and he included it in his Journal.

Sunday, May 14, 1738 – Wesley preached at St. Ann’s, Aldersgate and the Savoy chapel.  Again, he was told not to preach again at St. Ann’s.

Friday, May 19, 1738 – Charles Wesley “had a second return of his pleurisy.” 

Sunday, May 20, 1738 – John Wesley preached at several churches, with the now common result of being told to preach there no more.

Wednesday, May 24, 1738 – Wesley wrote that he had “‘continual sorrow and heaviness; in my ‘heart’.”  Then, he wrote a list of 18 items.  These items mentioned moments throughout his life up until the evening of May 24 at Aldersgate and continued on May 25.

Item number one covered age ten.  Item two covered years at school.  He admitted at this point he hoped to be saved by “(1) not being so bad as other people; (2) having still kindness for religion; and (3) reading the Bible, going to church, and saying my prayers.”  In item three he admitted no notion on inward holiness.  With item four he said his father pressed him into holy orders but read Kempis’s Christian Patterns which talked of religion seated in the heart.  Item five talked of “shaking off” trifling acquaintances.  His lady friends, with whom he wrote secret letters, were apparently not considered trifling acquaintances.  In fact, it was probably Miss Betty Kirkham or other correspondence lady members, not his mother Susanna, who first suggested him reading Kempis.  Item six was of 1730 time era and talked about visiting prisons and assisting the poor and sick.  In item seven he talked of inward holiness and a “union of the soul with God.”  Item eight talked of the Moravians. Item nine said, “All the time I was at Savannah I was thus beating the air.”

Item 10 stated … “for I was only striving with, not freed from, sin.   Neither had I the witness of the Spirit with my spirit, and indeed could not; for I ‘sought it not by faith, but as it were by the works of the law.’”

Item 11 referred to the storm on his return to England and how it made him realize his need for saving faith.  Wesley said,…”But Still I fixed not this faith on its right object; I meant only faith in God, not faith in or through Christ.”  Then, Wesley wrote Peter Bohler’s explanation of faith convinced him that “I had not faith.”

Item 12 had Wesley consider Scripture on instantaneous conversion and living experience.  Bohler provided Wesley with three witnesses “whom testified, of their own personal experience, that a true living faith in Christ is inseparable from a sense of pardon for all past and freedom from all present sins.  They added with one mouth that this faith was the gift, the free gift of God; and that He would surely bestow it upon every soul who earnestly and perseveringly sought it.  I was now thoroughly convinced; and, by the grace of God, I resolved to seek it unto the end, … “

Item 13  Wesley wrote, “I continued thus to seek it (though with strange indifference, dullness, and coldness, and unusually frequent relapses into sin) until Wednesday, May 24.  I think it was about five this morning, that I opened my Testament on those words ‘There are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises, even that ye should be partakers of  the divine nature’ (2 Pet. i. 4).”  An anthem at St. Paul’s further influenced Wesley.

Item 14 stated, “In the evening I went very unwillingly to a society in

Aldersgate Street

, where one was reading Luther’s preface to the Epistle to the Romans.  About a quarter before nine, while he was describing the change which God works in the heart through faith in Christ, I felt my heart strangely warmed.  I felt I did trust in Christ, Christ alone for salvation; and an assurance was given me that He had taken away my sins, even mine, and saved me from the law of sin and death.”  From Tyerman it continued,”… and I then testified openly to all there, what I now first felt in my heart.”

Spangenberg had questioned Wesley about this belief some time ago back in the developing Colony of Georgia and probable land of Spanish Florida.  See Sunday, Feb. 8, 1736.

Wesley continued on with several other items but ended with, “But then I was sometimes, if not often, conquered; now, I was always conqueror.

Thursday, May 25, 1738 – John Wesley said in his Journal, “The moment I awaked, ‘Jesus, Master,’ was in my heart and in my mouth; and I found all my strength lay in keeping my eye fixed upon Him, and my soul waiting on Him continually.  Wesley continued with his list to item 18 fighting fear.

Friday, May 26, 1738 – Wesley gained guidance from Mr. Toltschig, the Moravian, on temptations.  He said, “’You must not fight with them, as you did before, but flee from them the moment they appear, and take shelter in the wounds of Jesus.’” 

Spangenberg, the Moravian, had told him several years before in Frederica to avoid the troubles of Mrs. Hawkins.  See earlier post.

Sunday, May 28, 1738 – Wesley’s new voice is not understood or accepted by some friends.  The practice of being asked not to preach again continued at St. George’s and the chapel in Long Acre.  Wesley wrote, “’Not as I will, but as Thou wilt.’”

So, this blog is at an end.  The Wesley brothers were on the leading edge of intense spiritual excitement.  The phenomena they experienced would have far reaching results.  Some who witnessed this were perplexed and perhaps confused.  Wesley continued on for many years.  John Wesley is credited with founding Methodism. The Journal and Diaries of John Wesley fill eight volumes by Curnoch.  Before Curnoch, Rev. Luke Tyerman provided insight into Wesley’s Journal and diaries.  This journey, “Wesley’s Warming Journey” followed John Wesley from the time he arrived at Tybee Island to his warming at Aldersgate.  Through his words and actions, the reader might discern for themselves how Wesley came to what he believed was a true faith, and if it was this faith than enabled him to establish a church with a broad following of other seekers of what they hoped was true faith.

Wesley looked to Martin Luther’s Preface as a turning point.  Luther had his own epic turning points, such as the new power of the printing press, that provided opportunities for new thought and enlightenment.  Wesley had the opportunity to visit a new world steeped in the Atlantic Zone of conflict with Protestant and Catholic nation states vying for control.  It was a new nation in the making that he visited and later provided the opportunity and skilled clergy to lead a new way of looking at faith.  It was a changing England also caught up in this opportunity for a new way of accepting faith. 

On a personal note, on the day of his conversion, Wesley was experiencing an extraordinary time of returning to England from his American experience and all that it entailed, along with a visit to his ailing and aging influential mother, Susanna.  His openness to something different or profound was perhaps heightened.  In addition to his Holy Club, Wesley’s lady friends and correspondence circle had also influenced his heart along the way.  ‘Varanese’ or Miss Betty Kirkham or the Granville ladies might be credited to his reading of Kempis.  Tyerman said reading Kempis and Taylor brought an entire change of life.  Then, it was Peter Bohler, who Wesley only knew for a short time ( and around him personally from Feb. 7, 1738 to May 4, 1738), as Tyerman (P. 181) wrote influenced Wesley, “Wesley, after ten years of earnest prayer, rigorous fasting, and self-sacrificing peity, was brought into the blissful enjoyment of a conscious salvation.”  Tyerman (P. 177) also wrote from Bohler, “that this saving faith in Christ is given in a moment; and that in an instant a man is turned from sin and misery to righteousness and joy in the Holy Ghost.”  And, “He will surely give it to every one who earnestly and perseveringly prays for it.”

So it seems to me that while Wesley’s heart was stirred in the developing Colony of Georgia and Spanish Florida, it was part of a ten year process that had begun earlier with friends and culminated with his heart warming, instantaneous experience, in Aldersgate.  It is important to understand where he was and his activities during this process of “earnest prayer, rigorous fasting, and self-sacrificing peity.”

THE END – Brenda Rees | Shaping Florida “Wesley’s Warming Journey” May 24, 2012